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December 6, 2017

When Kinsey Millhone's landlord asks her to help deceased World War II vet Johnnie Lee's family find out why the military has no record of his service, she thinks it'll be a cinch. But she is about to meet her match in world-class prevaricators who take her for the ride of her life.When Lee's apartment in burgled and a man named Ray Rawson, who claims to be an old friend of Lee's, is beaten up, Kinsey soon finds herself on the trail of a pregnant woman with a duffel bag. Soon the intrepid P.I. is following leads halfway across the country and encountering another man from Lee's past—a vengeful psychopath.Stalked by a new enemy and increasingly suspicious of Rawson—not to mention running out of time and money—now Kinsey must steer a collision course to solve a decades-old mystery that some would like better left unsolved.…

L is another action-packed and thrilling installment in the
Kinsey Millhone series. This one barely takes place in California as Kinsey is
forced to Texas while following a lead.

It seems that she got into more nonsense than usual this
time around. I mean, she stole a maid’s uniform and pretended she was part of
housekeeping. Meanwhile, I was laughing
through it all.

These books have a way of being highly entertaining and
humorous while maintaining integrity and offering up a true thriller.

L keeps you on your toes and keeps the pages turning.

4/5 stars only because I missed the California crew.

Memorable Quotes: “I don’t mean to be a bitch, but in the
future I intend to hesitate before I do a favor for the friend of a friend.”

“This is the beauty of keeping up those skills. In a crisis
situation, I had only to open my mouth and a fib flopped out. An unpracticed
liar can’t always rise to the occasion like I can.”

“There’s a certain horror when you can’t quite remember
who’s whistling so merrily behind the bathroom door. Often, when I found out, I
couldn’t help but question my taste in male companionship. It didn’t take long
to see morality as the quickest way to avoid self-loathing.”

“’What do you know about family?’

‘Not a thing. That’s my point. I like all this bickering now
that I’ve got the hang of it.’”

“So far, almost everything I’d done was illegal except the
vacuuming – breaking into hotel rooms, aiding and abetting escaped felons.
Probably even the vacuuming broke some union contract. Why bother to get prissy
at this late date?”

October 12, 2017

Led by stars like Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane, Duncan
Keith, and Brent Seabrook, the Chicago Blackhawks are a modern NHL powerhouse,
as much a part of Chicago as the Willis Tower or The Bean at Millennium Park.
In If These Walls Could Talk: Chicago Blackhawks, Mark Lazerus chronicles the
team's rise from the dark ages of the 2000s to the golden age of the 2010s
through never-before-told stories from inside the dressing room, aboard the
team plane, at the players' homes, and — especially in the case of the rowdy
2009-2010 team that started it all — in countless Chicago bars. If These Walls
Could Talk: Chicago Blackhawks will bring readers closer to their favorite
players than ever before. It's a book Hawks fans won't want to be without.

Now, maybe I am a bit biased. The Chicago Blackhawks are my
life and I thoroughly enjoy reading what Mark has to say on Twitter and
interacting with him. When he dropped a book about the team, it was a
no-brainer to pre-order it. I knew that I would, at the very least, have fun
reading it.

What I didn’t expect was the emotional rollercoaster that
this book was going to take me on.

Mark lays out the framework for how the Chicago Blackhawks
went from being one of the worst franchises in sports to being at the top of
the world as 3-time Stanley Cup Champions with this core group. He interjects
stories and quotes from players and coaches. It really takes you on a ride.

Now, the book is pretty short for one that spans over
multiple years, losses, heartbreaks, and the resurgence of a lifetime. Despite
its length, it packs one hell of a punch. I found myself laughing a lot at
their antics, and I founds myself crying like a baby reliving the glory of
those championship years and reading about how the players love each other and
this city.

Mark Lazerus is a writer. It’s what he does for a living.
The writing was going to be good. But he took so many years . . . so many
emotions . . . and jammed them all into a paperback novel that will make you
feel something. If you’re a Blackhawks fan, you’ll end up like me. If you’re a
fan of any team other than the Pittsburgh Penguins, it may fill you with rage
because you’re sick of these players having success. Regardless, it will make
you FEEL. That right there is what makes this a great book.

July 27, 2017

Lorna Kepler was beautiful and willful, a loner who couldn't
resist flirting with danger. Maybe that's what killed her.

Her death had raised a host of tough questions. The cops
suspected homicide, but they could find neither motive nor suspect. Even the
means were mysterious: Lorna's body was so badly decomposed when it was
discovered that they couldn't be certain she hadn't died of natural causes. In
the way of overworked cops everywhere, the case was gradually shifted to the
back burner and became another unsolved file.

Only Lorna's mother kept it alive, consumed by the certainty
that somebody out there had gotten away with murder.

In the ten months since her daughter's death, Janice Kepler
had joined a support group, trying to come to terms with her loss and her
anger. It wasn't helping. And so, leaving a session one evening and noticing a
light on in the offices of Millhone Investigations, she knocked on the door.

In answering that knock, Kinsey Millhone is pulled into the
netherworld of unavenged murder, where only a pact with the devil will satisfy
the restless ghosts of the victims and give release to the living they have
left behind.

I just need to mention how much I love Kinsey as a
character. I feel like I identify with her and her sassiness and general
inability to deal with people’s nonsense. She makes me laugh every time I read
one of the books. She also has actual deep feeling though, and those were on
display in this book with Danielle. It is a shame we will not be able to know
whether they could develop a deeper friendship or not.

This was one of those mystery books were everyone seems like
they are guilty. They are all a little bit off, and I was almost positive that
everyone was guilty at one point. I am extremely dissatisfied with how this
novel closed though. I feel like there was no real conclusion and that it wasn’t
actually solved.

I wish we would have figured out more about the motive of
the murder, more about the relationships that Lorna had with people, and who
the heck she was getting married to. There were a lot of things that I wanted
more of, but I guess it would have been too long of a book at that point.

Reading about Kinsey barely sleeping and then messing up her
sleeping schedule was also hilarious and I felt myself identifying with her
more.

If we could have
gotten more of a resolution and a deeper dive into the relationships, this book
would get a full 5-star rating.

3/5 Stars

Memorable Quotes: "I'm the current ranking expert at reading upside down and seldom hesitate to insert myself into matters that are not my concern."

“Sometimes anxiety and caffeine have the same effect.”

“I could feel my stomach lurch at the thought of more
coffee. The cups I’d consumed were already making my brain vibrate like an
out-of-balance washing machine.”

“I fell asleep wondering if there was a cause-and-effect
relationship between memory loss and abstinence. Apparently so, as that was the
last thing I was aware of for the next four hours.”

“If I’d gone to bed at nine or even ten o’clock, I could
have slept through the night. But now my sleep permit had reached its
expiration point. Having stayed awake this long, I was consigned to further
wakefulness.”

“’I didn’t actually say that, but if I did, I lied. I’m
really a wretched person. I’m sorry you didn’t understand that. Now get out of
my car’”

“My phone rang at noon. I’d been awake for an hour but
unwilling to stir. Having completed my transmigration into the nocturnal
realms, I found the notion of getting up any time before two repugnant.”